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Technology Stocks : The New Qualcomm - a S&P500 company -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: slacker711 who wrote (3681)	11/28/1999 3:25:00 PM
From: quartersawyer	Respond to of 13582

Does One.Tel already have cellular operations in Europe? Their $20 billion network will start from scratch. Their Australian system is GSM. And yes, since they'll start 3G with all new spectrum, it will be CDMA. Lucent's rhetoric as a new member of the GSM Association is somewhat misleading, and must be read between the lines as positive face-saving spin for the good of the members while conversion costs become imminent. The Chairman of the GSM Association says: "Lucent will benefit from close cooperation with our members on a wide array of issues as we will benefit from a well of technology expertise in the field of GSM evolution and development." (Don't displaced species evolve into small niches?) Lucent is developing and selling everything, but as they build out a 2.5 million subscriber GSM system in Australia, commence the operation, then turn it over to One.Tel, bear in mind that they are, I believe, financing the project 100%. The Western Europe business with One.Tel is reported to be along the same lines. Hard to believe, but this reads as $20 billion of Lucent financing for the new network. I hope to see reports soon to clarify this. As you say, the likes of China and India can't afford the 3G networks they want, so I'd guess Nortel, Ericsson, Motorola and Lucent will do the financing everywhere. I think Q was carrying about $400 million of vendor financing when the infra div. was sold. I think Ericsson had about $7 billion on their books last Spring and maybe some not so obvious. I wonder if Q makes any accommodation to the vendors for this. The royalty value of infrastructure spending (Gregg P. once had gross profit margin on infra. revenues as 15% less R and D, less S G and A, but no royalty # since it was Q's revenue) might more happily be considered along with the inevitable torrent that follows the buildout. One important point in this announcement is that it knocks the "who needs it?" 3G argument into a cocked hat. If one low cost provider has the system, they all need it.